


The Ghost Library

by chockymousse



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Ben Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves Friendship, Ben Hargreeves Deserves Better, Ben Hargreeves is a good boi who just wants to read books, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:21:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25989658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chockymousse/pseuds/chockymousse
Summary: “Wait, this is actually a library?”“Klaus -”“No, but I mean, this is where you get your books.  Books that you can actually read and interact with in public, when we’re out and about, without scaring people.  You know, ghost books.  Is this a ghost library?”
Relationships: Ben Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves
Comments: 2
Kudos: 50





	The Ghost Library

**Author's Note:**

> Because I was curious where Ben gets his books, and decided to create a whole headcanon around it.

Klaus’ feet dragged on the concrete footpath and Ben didn't have to turn around to know the precise hangdog expression on his brother’s face. Ben heard him sigh, an over the top avalanche of a sigh, "Where are we going again?"

"I told you," Ben said easily, "We're going to the library."

"The library?" Klaus whined, putting his whole body behind his show of dismay, "come on Ben. Dalmonte’s Wafflehaus is just two blocks from here, can’t we get waffles instead? You always loved waffles."

Ben paused for a moment and pursed his lips in thought, he did like waffles. He shook his head, “Library first,” he said decisively, “waffles later.” And almost like magic the devilish grin that had taken over Klaus’ face was replaced by a small “o” of disappointment.

Klaus thought of all the ways he could get out of accompanying his brother on this little errand, of all the ways Ben owed him… but he hadn’t been thinking too long before he remembered that really, it was probably he who owed Ben and not the other way around. Klaus scowled and silently vowed to do better. He’d start tomorrow. Or Monday. Or maybe it was just the thought that counts, afterall?

He’d honestly never been to the library, but he had a pretty good idea of what a library should look like, and it wasn’t anything like the piano repair shop Ben had just ducked into. He did a double take of the sign above the door, the piano in the window, the recital flyers taped on the door through which his brother had just disappeared. Klaus heard the tinkle of the bell above his head when he walked in. Things had just become a little more interesting.

-

Klaus wandered in and waved at the woman reading behind the front counter, she didn’t look up. Ben shoved his hands into his pockets and watched Klaus approach, just waiting for what he knew would be coming next.

Klaus cleared his throat. Nothing.

Klaus leaned forward over the counter to try and catch the woman’s eye. Nothing.

Klaus waved a hand now right in front of the woman’s face. Nothing.

Ben rolled his eyes, “Are you done?”

Klaus scrutinized the woman’s face like someone might a dissected frog, or a severed finger. He decided that she was definitely alive, at least of a sort, her eyes scanned each line and her lips moved as though she were saying the words aloud as she read them.

“Is she alright?” Klaus asked, his finger pointed at her lips, his face close enough to whisper in her ear.

“She’s fine. She just can’t, you know, perceive you. Right now.”

Klaus turned to Ben with his mouth agape just like Pikachu in the famous meme. “I’m invisible now?” The devilish grin was back.

Ben tipped his head back and took a breath, “No, you’re not invisible you’re more like… a ghost.”

Klaus pointed at himself, “I’m dead?”

Ben wilted, though happily only temporarily. “No, but that would be easier to explain. You know what? Yes. For the moment, let’s say that you died.”

Klaus affected a concerned tone, “I feel like I’d remember dying.”

“Nope,” Ben assured him, grabbing his arm and dragging him with him through the doorway that led to a second piano room, “no memory whatsoever. Take it from someone who knows. Been there, done that, no idea how it happened.”

Klaus was quiet. Ben became concerned. He looked over at his brother and immediately knew the cause of the silence. He let go of Klaus’ arm and they shared a look.

“You… you were touching me. Your hand was on my arm and you were pulling me along behind you, I felt it, Ben -”

Ben gave his brother a half smile, “You’re a ghost now, too, remember?”

Klaus turned suddenly serious and nodded.

-

Ben took Klaus through the back of the shop and out to an old stairwell that led to the roof. Ben seemed to know where he was going so Klaus followed along behind. He had all but forgotten why they were out here in the first place. Something about a library, and then he had somehow died, and now Ben felt real again. As they climbed, Klaus noticed Ben’s trousers, the ones he’d been wearing for the last thirteen years, looked perfect. Brand new, even. Klaus wondered if his thrifted silk blouse would wear so well in the afterlife.

They climbed for a while, too long really just to get to the roof, and found themselves outside an old looking grey stone building.

Klaus dusted himself off, “I gotta say, I’m disappointed I can’t even, like, float as a ghost or whatever.”

Ben shot him a look, “And when have you ever seen me float? Or any of the other countless spirits you’ve interacted with?”

Klaus ignored the look and shrugged, “You never know. Where are we, anyway?”

“Seriously?” Ben squinted at him, unsure whether or not his brother was just being difficult.

Klaus looked surprised and waved his hands around a bit, “Well I don’t know, do I? I was following you!”

Ben pointed obviously at the big bronze plaque next to the door, The Library, it said.

“Ohhhhhh, the Library. Of course, the Library. The Library out the back of and too high above a random piano tuning place downtown to actually exist. The Library.”

Ben ignored him and walked inside.

-

Inside was, indeed, a library. Klaus watched as Ben pulled a paperback out of nowhere and posted it through the RETURNS chute. Ben had been reading this book just the other day, he recognised the bright green cover.

“Wait, this is actually a library?”

“Klaus -”

“No, but I mean, this is where you get your books. Books that you can actually read and interact with in public, when we’re out and about, without scaring people. You know, ghost books. Is this a ghost library?”

Ben flinched, an unreadable expression passing over his face, then sighed. "Well I'd been trying to avoid that terminology but, yeah, essentially. Apparently this place holds the entire history of… of everything. What was, what will be blah blah. You've seen movies, you know how it goes."

Klaus's eyes lit up, "For real?"

Ben nodded, "For real."

"The entire history of the world? Of everyone? Of everything?" 

Klaus' demeanor was teetering on the edge of something more manic than usual, and perhaps Ben should have been worried, but Ben also knew something (many somethings) that Klaus didn't. So he just smiled and shrugged and spun around as he walked on inside, "That's what they tell me."

-

In the end it wasn't long before Klaus figured out the first, and arguably the most important, something for himself. He followed Ben into the stacks and wouldn't you know it, the first time he tried to take a book off the shelf? His hand ghosted straight through it. Klaus stared at his hands and then looked over at Ben who was fingering spines, pulling books off shelves, and flipping through pages as though this was something he did every day.

"Uh, Ben?"

Ben didn't look up from the blurb he was reading, "Yeah?"

"I thought you said we were both ghosts now,"

Ben's lips twitched, "I lied."

Klaus rushed over to Ben's side, starting to freak out now that he was the one who couldn't interact with the world. He swallowed, "Ben?"

Ben's eyes slid over to meet Klaus' wild stare, "Yeah?"

"Am I dead? Really dead? Dead like, deadsies?"

Ben put his book back and shook his head, "No, Klaus, I'm still the only one of us who's dead. You said it yourself, this is a ghost library. For ghosts. That's why you can't interact properly with anything in here."

Klaus doubled over with a gasp, "Oh thank God. I mean - you know what I mean. I'm glad I'm not dead. I wasn't planning on wearing this shirt for the rest of time, you know?"

Ben rolled his eyes and clapped his brother on the shoulder, "You're gonna be fine."

And since the living were as good as ghosts in the library, Ben figured Klaus couldn't get himself in too much trouble, for once, and let him wander off to amuse himself. In the library Ben could finally breathe.

-

A while later Ben found Klaus reclined on a beanbag in the children's area. He looked sad, or bored, or maybe both. Not what Ben had expected when he brought his brother to the house of all knowledge.

Ben slipped his library bag off his shoulder and collapsed into one of the other beanbags.

"What's up with you?"

Klaus picked at the hem of his shirt, "Nothing. Well, and it is nothing, too, because the cute librarian couldn't even see me, let alone hear the fabulous and witty lines I was using on him. My dazzling smile, my fluttering eyelids… all for nothing."

"Alright, I think we're done here. Let me go check out these books and we'll head on back to the land of the living. Waffle time, right?"


End file.
